A musical polymath, Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol has composed for, performed and toured with international stars and ensembles such as Dave Liebman, Bob Brookmeyer, Billy Cobham, Esperanza Spalding, Gil Goldstein, Antonio Sanchez, Anat Cohen, Tiger Okoshi, Tommy Smith, Miguel Zenón, The Boston Camerata, The Boston Cello Quartet, A Far Cry string orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Okay Temiz, Erkan Oğur and Birol Yayla. Sanlıkol’s unique blend of jazz composition and Turkish music has been praised by the Boston Globe as “a true fusion of jazz and folkloric Turkish language and colors.” Sanlıkol pairs Turkish instruments such as zurna (double reed wind), ney (end-blown flute), kös (large kettledrums) and nekkare (small kettledrums) with the jazz orchestra/combo to perform his Turkish music-influenced compositions, in which Turkish makam (mode) and usul (rhythmic cycles) are intertwined with modern jazz as well as specifically film noir influenced music. To achieve the same goal on keyboard instruments he has designed and conceived the SANLIKOL Renaissance 17, a digital microtonal keyboard with 17 keys per octave.

On the other hand, his “coffeehouse opera”, entitled Othello in the Seraglio: The Tragedy of Sümbül The Black Eunuch, which has been the recipient of the Paul R. Judy Center grant at Eastman School of Music in 2015, bridges the musical cultures of opera house and coffeehouse, Baroque Italy and Ottoman Turkey. This love story is designed to draw the audiences into a meditation on race, slavery, sexuality and the entwined histories of East and West. With music from 16th and 17th-century European and Turkish sources, arranged, adapted, and woven together with original music by Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol, this unique opera has been performed 20 times since its premiere in 2015 on European period instruments and traditional Turkish instruments by an ensemble of specialists in those fields.

Sanlıkol is the president of DÜNYA, a musicians’ collective dedicated to contemporary presentations of Turkish traditions, alone and in interaction with other world traditions, through musical performance, publication, and educational activities. Since its founding Sanlıkol has produced, performed and delivered talks at over two hundred DÜNYA events. DÜNYA has also released 10 CDs, a single, a concert DVD, and a documentary film featuring Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol, both as a director/performer and a composer. The unique nature and the success of DÜNYA resulted in Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol going on the air numerous times on NPR and PRI.

Sanlıkol actively delivers papers and talks at academic conferences such as International Conference on Analytical Approaches to World Music and Society for Ethnomusicology. Sanlıkol’s first book, entitled The Musician Mehters, about the organization and the music of the Ottoman Janissary Bands has been published during 2011 in English by The ISIS press and in Turkish by Yapı Kredi Yayınları. His second book, entitled Reform, Notation and Ottoman music in Early 19th Century Istanbul: EUTERPE, was published by Routledge in 2023. Currently, he is the director of New England Conservatory’s Intercultural Institute.